Transformation
by Vera Kate
Summary: The future, the past - it is all connected through a series of memories. Chloe is trying her best to focus on her future when long forgotten memories resurface.


**A/N:** This is just a one-shot that I've been working on/off for the past month or so, but I think I finally hit an "end' to it. I hope you'll let me know your thoughts! This is a bit ... meta? It involves some current television shows that are on the air right now, so ... kind of?

**Disclaimer: **I don't own the _Otherworld_ universe by Kelley Armstrong.

* * *

Chloe sighed as she checked her watch. The meeting was supposed to start in five minutes and the story pitchers weren't even pacing the hallways. She looked around at the room; other hopefuls like herself that wanted to break into the film industry were all in their selected seats. She recognized a handful from her various writing classes at the University of Toronto but there were more that she didn't. There had been more and more Americans coming from Los Angeles with the booming Canadian filming industry. Well, perhaps less booming and more along the lines of the networks realizing they could lower production costs by filming in Canada. Chloe herself was American but she had spent almost the past decade in Canada. She hadn't made anything official but there were some days that she definitely leaned more towards one identity than the other. It was complicated.

The clacking of heels sounded in the hallway and she looked towards it. Her position leant itself to being able to see what was coming up next. She liked that ability. She also had a bit of insider knowledge and by rules of elimination this was the project Sean wanted her on at all costs.

The show runner walked in and Chloe _knew_ something was up. She whispered something to her companion – another showrunner? Sean had only mentioned the one – and they started gathering materials from a messenger bag.

"Hello everyone," the showrunner greeted. She looked fairly young to be a showrunner, early thirties, long blonde hair, and glasses. It was certainly different than the rest of the showrunners she had seen earlier.

She began her pitch and Chloe understood instantly why Sean had wanted her on this project.

* * *

Chloe hung back, flipping through the booklet that had been given out. She remained sitting while everyone else filtered out the door. She looked around the room; no one else was staying but her. All the better for her.

She gathered her things and went up to showrunner and introduced herself. She handed her a sample script that served as her resume.

"I normally wouldn't do this, but I'd really like to talk more about your project," she led off with. "I've always been drawn to the idea of supernaturals," Chloe revealed. "If you don't have time, I understand, but I'd really like to know more because just based off your presentation, if you'll have me, I'm all in."

* * *

Chloe sighed as she tossed her bag inside the foyer. It landed with a thud a few inches short of the chair she normally kept it in.

"You know what project Sean wanted you on?"

Chloe let out a laugh and walked into the office. Derek had his textbooks spread across his desk, his laptop in the middle showing some sort of modeling project.

"I do. I don't know if I should tell you. I did sign all of those nondisclosure forms and everything."

"When was the last time you saw me write anything?"

"Isn't that your thesis project?"

"That's different," he replied. Chloe rolled her eyes. Technically speaking, it was _her_ that was supporting them both.

Things were better now. They had hit a few rough patches while they were dealing with their own respective courses of undergrad. It didn't exactly help that their degree programs were on different campuses and that it wasn't uncommon for them not to see each other for days despite sharing an apartment. Add on to it now that Chloe had taken a break from school. Derek wasn't happy with it at all, but they were tired of having that same argument over and over again. The experience would be worth more than a degree. And in the worst case scenario, the university would always be there for her to finish the degree. That was what Chloe's argument had boiled down to and when she pointed out that she didn't necessarily _need_ a degree, it only further stressed how different their aspirations were.

Well – maybe it wasn't _just_ Chloe supporting them. She had agreed to take a stipend from Sean Nast while Derek was in school if she would direct her work to the projects he pointed at her. Truth be told, it was an easy in for her – getting her name to the proper circles wasn't as easy as she thought it was. It wasn't just a matter of having a good, solid script these days.

Generally they were supernatural shows that sometimes edged a little too close to the truth. It was her job to make sure that they didn't get too close. Often, she found, that her being there was pointless as the networks seemed to be cutting back on their science fantasy television. Vampires were still a hot market item and Sean didn't have any concerns about the shows dealing with them. The folklore surrounding vampires was already steeped errors and they kept veering further away from the truth. It was simply Sean hedging his bets that in the small likelihood of a show being picked up, Chloe would be on it. It was being very conservative given the likelihood of _any_ show being picked up, and then the odds worsened when supernatural terms like 'sorcerers' and 'demons' were thrown around. She learned that the last pilot season when the show she Sean wanted her on didn't even have the full pilot shown to the top executives.

Chloe suspected that while it was easily more beneficial on her end – the connections, the guaranteed paycheck – but she knew that it didn't come from a place of charity. She was selling her services, and more importantly influence of the Cabal, for this and she had to keep that in mind. Sean could always rescind the offer, but she didn't suspect that would happen. So far, Sean had been fair in all of their dealings, even when he easily could have swindled them.

"Well, I suppose I should tell you," she teased. "It's about werewolves."

"You can stop there," he said, turning back to his computer. Chloe let out a small laugh. Derek _hated_ any sort of show or movie with werewolves. She had tried sneaking a book past him once but it sat on his desk for a month before she took it back, unread. He simply didn't have time for leisure reading. Or perhaps he made it into the second chapter and put it back on the desk instead of throwing it out the window.

"Do you any clue why Sean wanted you working on it? Just trying to make a token effort to keep Elena happy?"

This was the first time that Sean had sent a werewolf focused show her way. Cabals still adhered to their 'no werewolves' allowed policy. Sean was hoping that Derek would change that. He still hadn't decided.

"Now that is where it becomes a bit less funny." She leaned against the door frame and sighed. "It's about a pack of werewolves … and there is only one female werewolf in existence."

He swore.

"I know, but it's … it's both accurate and totally wrong."

"You talk to Sean yet?"

"I have to make sure I have the job first. I don't need him pulling strings if they aren't necessary. I _should _have no problem_, _no one else hung around afterwards to give her a sample. I don't really see this going for a pick-up but you know Sean, get in on the ground level."

* * *

Chloe sighed as she tried calling Sean again. His receptionist kept telling her that he was out of the office but this was too big to leave as a message. She had been trying to get ahold of him for the past two days.

Her phone buzzed and she felt elevation combined with dread.

"Sean?"

"What is wrong, Chloe?"

"It's the _Bitten_ project. I … we've received notes back from the network. They don't like her name, so it's no longer Grace. It's … they picked Elena."

The silence was louder than any words he could have hurled at her.

"I've done my best to try to throw them off. I've tried saying people will confuse it with Helena or be familiar with it and that they need to pick a more mainstream one but they're not budging on this one. I'm going to try to make a push for a nickname."

"Do whatever you have to Chloe. If _this_ goes ahead and its Elena's name everywhere, you know that things are going to look very bad."

"I know, I know, I swear."

* * *

Later that night Chloe sat staring at her laptop. Derek was in the other room. She _wanted_ tell him about her day but she couldn't. She'd spill about the name issue and he would _flip_ out. She couldn't handle that, not after Sean's reaction. She hadn't wanted to call Sean but … well, if she hadn't, she was sure that she would have made a one way trip to Nast HQ.

He had assured her that he would try something on his end and if that wasn't successful, he would be the one to tell Elena about the project. Chloe was anxious, nevertheless. She knew that the likelihood of Elena blaming her for this was small, but it was something that she didn't want hanging over her head.

She found herself mindlessly surfing the internet when a forum post caught her eye. She opened it.

* * *

_One year later_

The writing room was ecstatic. They had a pick up. Chloe was happy, although not exactly for the same reasons they were.

_Bitten_ was happening. She was glad in the most practical senses – she now had a steady income besides the stipend. She wasn't thrilled with the idea of having Sean and Elena breathing down her neck about the show. Her push for a nickname had fallen completely flat. They had _liked_ that Elena sounded just foreign enough to catch the ear, yet it was simple enough that people could 'picture' how it was written.

Derek shared her feelings, which helped. If he had been overly cheerful, she'd be concerned that someone had kidnapped him. He swore that it wouldn't be like this, that things would pick up on his end that that she wouldn't be making the rent check every month.

The next year … was certainly going to be an interesting one.

* * *

_One year later_

She had done a reasonable job during the first season. It turned out that steering the show mythos away when it was getting too close to the real deal proved to be easier than she had envisioned. She had assumed a role in the writer's room for knowing the most about supernatural folklore. They all had thought that she simply knew what she knew because of things she had read. They never would have guessed the truth in a thousand years and that was the way that she had wanted it.

The head writer/showrunner had called her in for a meeting to discuss new characters and the direction the show was going to go in season two.

"I had this great idea last night," she gushed to Chloe. "The first season was about identity and all of those classic themes, right? And we kept a tight focus on Elena and the other werewolves. But what if there was more?"

"More … werewolves? We left that option open with Malcolm still being alive and I'm sure it'd make sense that he wouldn't have sent everyone to storm Stonehaven."

"Well, yes, but what if we also brought in other supernaturals?"

"Are there any types you have in mind?"

"Now, you see, this is what I was thinking … we are going to pull in all of them."

Chloe gave a slight shake of her head and quickly sipped some coffee. She wished she had something stronger.

"I know, I know, but hear me out. The first season was about identity and the Pack and all of that. We can't rehash that over again and just werewolves fighting werewolves would get old. But if we introduced other supernaturals, we would have a lot of different plot lines that we could explore for several seasons."

"You don't think that's going to throw off the audience? I've checked the message boards. We have a strong identity as 'the female werewolf show'. If we go too far off our brand, we could lose our core audience. We don't want to pull a _True Blood_."

"Elena will remain our main character, I'm not arguing that. But what if she ran into a witch? Or a demon? Or a necromancer?"

A chill went down Chloe's spine. This must be what the werewolves must have felt when the show premiered. This was too close for comfort. She wanted to ignore it, shut it down. Suddenly Derek's reaction made perfect sense.

"But … what could possibly bring all of those types together? I could see something pulling Elena to one type or another, but all of them in one season?"

"Season one was about Elena finding her identity, right? What if season two was about her embracing it and fighting to keep it?"

Chloe leaned back in her chair.

This was going to be a long year.

* * *

They were several months into prepping the overall arc for the season, as well as developing the new characters to the point where casting could begin.

There were going to be other supernaturals. Thankfully she had talked them out of the necromancer one. That was treading way too close for comfort. She also had managed to get them to cut the demons but instead have demon worshippers.

They were a supernatural show. She wasn't overly concerned with people being upset about the idea of portraying demon worshippers, especially considering that even classifying them as 'demon worshippers' was a bit of a stretch. Technically they were more along the lines of druids since the 'demons' were primarily different nature elements, but Chloe didn't want to get bogged down in those details. If they wanted to call them demon worshippers to 'up the ante', she was going to let them have it. That wasn't her hill to die on and Sean wasn't concerned about the half-demon exposure.

Derek was out of the apartment. He had called earlier saying that he was going to be stuck at the lab until late and that she shouldn't stay up.

She had been waiting and dreading this opportunity.

Of course, she had heard about the remake. It was hard to be involved in the writing business and _not_ hear about things like this. _Especially_ this, considering how huge it was, is, and the huge implications of it all.

She had been a huge fan. She had the backpack, the dolls, and probably more than her fair share of decorative pencils.

_Sailor Moon_ was now … rebooted, of sorts. She was young when it first aired. She had watched it with her mom after school.

She pulled up the website and her mouse hovered over the play button. She hadn't expected to feel so … emotional about this. But no, she should have known that it would pull at her memories. Some of her most vivid memories were of her and her mom going down the apartment stairwells, her backpack bouncing on her back as they raced down to see who would win.

Chloe choked back a sob and hit play.

* * *

Chloe kicked the rock a few feet ahead of her on the sidewalk. She met it and kicked it again. She did this until she found a bench that she liked and sat down.

She breathed in deep and took a look of her surroundings. It was a park, yes, but the sounds of the city were barging in if she listened closely enough. Buses honking, people shouting, the general noise of cars and emergency services.

Derek had strongly hinted that he'd like to talk once he was finished at the lab. She wasn't necessarily sure if she was ready to talk to him about all of this.

She had two sides that were demanding attention from her. There was the future, her work, her handling of the way the supernaturals were portrayed in the show and making sure that the show was _good_. She had worked for a job like this. It was where she wanted to be, or at least for now. It was good writing experience and she saw how the crew interacted. It was much different than the makeshift film projects she tried to corral her "senior" year at Badger Lake.

And then … there was her past, five year old little Chloe whose biggest issues were what type of after school snack she was having with mom. Even though the show was _different_, the characters were the same and brought memories that she thought were lost or never existed back up to the surface.

If it had just been one or the other, she could deal. It was the fact that now she was trying to juggle who she was and how having to make sure that her future wasn't exposed to the entire world.

She rested her head in her hands. She sighed. Of course she knew that by watching the video, she would be inviting … something in, but she hadn't expected this. Not the old memories, not the brief glimpses where she and her mom were playing with her dolls.

Now it felt as though she had just died last week, the scab had finally torn free.

Chloe went back to the apartment, dreading the conversation that Derek wanted.

* * *

Chloe did what she did best – she threw herself into her work. She told herself she didn't have _time_ to deal with something as minor as childhood memories being brought back because a show was rebooted. She would have to get used to the idea. In the film and television business, that was bread and butter and the intervals between reboots were growing shorter with each year.

Season two's arc had finally been nailed down and they were fine tuning all of the different character arcs.

Work had become a bit less demanding, although there was the looming stress of casting. There were still a few new characters that _needed_ to be casted yesterday. Chloe knew that the actor's energy could make all of the pre-planned arcs useless if it didn't match up.

Her phone buzzed and she glanced at it. Derek had left her a voicemail. She might be able to squeeze time at during one of their breaks to check it. There was some paranoia with regards to plot details leaking out to the internet and phones were not allowed to be used in the writers' room.

She excused herself and listened to half of it before stopping it. She didn't have time for this. She had … things to focus on. She would let herself get angry later. She had to keep herself focused.

Derek was home when she came back to the apartment. The fury that had been building in her all day had reached its boiling point a long time ago and it was now just simmering, waiting for him to disturb it.

"You get my message?"

"Part of it," she clipped her reply. She looked around uneasily. She didn't want to have this conversation with him but she could tell by the set of his jaw that words were going to be exchanged.

Derek sat there, not responding to her.

"How long have you been going?"

"A few weeks," she said, finally leaving the foyer and standing awkwardly next to the sofa.

"And?"

"And what?"

"I guess … why?"

"It's not about us, if that what has you concerned," she said. "It's strictly a 'me' topic."

"I know our schedules haven't been the best at lining up but you know that you can tell me anything."

Chloe nodded but she didn't believe it. There were some aspects of her life that Derek simply wouldn't get, no matter how he tried. How could she even try to talk to him about this? He wasn't exactly known as being Mr. Empathy, hence the therapist. It was also embarrassing, considering that she should be _over_ it and that it was just a stupid cartoon.

How exactly would that even go? "Hey Derek, I'm having an emotional crisis because a cartoon that I used to watch with my mom is being remade and has reopened some old memories that I didn't know I had and look, I still miss my Mom?"

He wouldn't be able to help. Derek had never known his mother and never took up Sean's offer at trying to track her down. He simply didn't _care_ that he had a mother out there. The story was that she just donated the egg but what if it was more? What if it was a normal pregnancy and they took him from her? What if she still wondered about him?

But this was Derek. That was taking a lot of hypotheticals and feelings of hypotheticals. He wasn't the best at dealing with the feelings of people he did care about.

"It's … I've just been having a hard time, that's all," she finally said. "It's just stress, I guess."

She didn't like keeping this from him, like some sort of dirty secret that she was ashamed of. But she knew that he wouldn't understand. He'd tell her to get over it, more or less.

"I know it's not that. You would be having longer hours if that was."

Shit.

"I just really don't want to get into it. And that is me being polite and saying drop it. I'm not going to talk about it to you. You wouldn't understand – you couldn't."

He didn't say anything. He simply went into the office and shut the door.

* * *

Things did get better, further down the line. Things were busy. Derek was wrapping up his thesis that he had started two years ago as part of an independent studies course. Chloe was pulling in long hours at the writers' room as shooting had begun and the dreaded rewrites were in full swing.

Chloe thought Derek was asleep when she pulled the latest episode up. She found that each one it hurt a bit less. She could at least make it through an entire episode without having to take a break.

Well, most of them. Tonight's episode was one that she was dreading – the topic of a mother dying and the girl growing up not knowing anything about her.

"What are you watching?"

Chloe turned around to see Derek standing there, half asleep. He looked more alert once he saw that she was upset.

"What is it?"

Chloe bit her lip and looked back to the screen. She was most of the way through it. It just … well, if she did it now, he might think he simply dreamed it or better yet, not even remember it in his half asleep state.

She told him. She told him everything. She told him about five year old Chloe, she told him about the memories that resurfaced as a result of watching it again, she told him about how it reminded her of the loss in her life and the guilt that she didn't feel the loss as strongly as she believed she should have.

Derek didn't say anything. He let her go on, never interrupting.

He simply embraced her.


End file.
